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A national language is a language (or language variant, e.g. dialect) that has some connection--de facto or de jure--with people and the territory they occupy. There is little consistency in the use of this term. One or more languages spoken as first languages in the territory of a country may be referred to informally or designated in legislation as national languages of the country. National or national languages are mentioned in over 150 world constitutions.[1][dead link]

C.M.B. Brann, with particular reference to India, suggests that there are "four quite distinctive meanings" for national language in a polity:[2]

"Territorial language" (chthonolect, sometimes known as chtonolect[3]) of a particular people

Official versus national languages

"National language" and "official language" are best understood as two concepts or legal categories with ranges of meaning that may coincide, or may be intentionally separate. Stateless nations are not in the position to legislate an official language, but their languages may be sufficiently distinct and well-preserved to be national languages. Some languages may be recognized popularly as "national languages," while others may enjoy official recognition in use or promotion.

In many African countries, some or all indigenous African languages are officially used, promoted, or expressly allowed to be promoted (usually taught in schools and written in important publications) as semi-official languages whether by long-term legislation or short-term, case-by-case executive (government) measures. To be official, spoken and written languages may enjoy government or federalised use, major tax-funded promotion or at least full tolerance as to their teaching and employers' recognition in public education, standing on equal footing with the official language(s). Further, they may enjoy recognition as a language used in compulsory schooling and treasury money may be spent to teach or encourage adults in learning a language which is a minority language in a particular area to restore its understanding and spread its moral stories, rhymes, poems, phrases, songs, and other literary heritage which will promote social cohesion (where other languages remain) or will promote nationalist differentiation where another, non-indigenous language is deprecated.[4][5]

Armenia

Armenia's national language is a separate branch in the linguistic family of Indo-European languages, Armenian. Armenian is widely spoken in Armenia as well as in its diaspora. The Armenian spoken in Armenia is known as Eastern Armenian, and this dialect is spoken as well, in the Armenian communities of Russia and Iran. While on the other hand, other Armenian communities such as the Armenian communities of Lebanon, Syria, Jerusalem etc. speak the Western Armenian dialect. |°

Australia

Australia has no official language, but is largely monolingual with English being the de facto national language. A considerable proportion of first and second generation migrants are bilingual. According to Ethnologue, 81% of people spoke English at home, including L2 speakers. Other languages spoken at home included Chinese 2.9%, Italian 1.2%, Arabic 1.1%, Greek 1%, Vietnamese 0.9% and Spanish 0.4%.[7]

There were almost 400 languages spoken by Indigenous Australians prior to the arrival of Europeans. Only about 70 of these languages have survived and all but 30 of these are now endangered.

Besides these there many Indigenous languages of Canada which are the national languages of one or more of Canada's First Nations groups, Inuit and Métis (mixed First Nations-European peoples); a number of First Nations legislate at the Indigenous government levels their language as an official language of the Nation, such is the case with the Nisg?a'a language in Nisg?a'a. Notably the Cree language is spoken (with variations) from Alberta to Labrador,[]Anishinaabemowin is spoken across central Canada and Inuktitut is spoken across the arctic.

China

There are many languages spoken across China, with most people speaking one of several varieties of Chinese. During successive imperial dynasties, the spoken language of the capital city served as the official spoken language and was used across the country by government officials who traveled to communicate with one another. Dialects used for this purpose in different eras included those of Xi'an, Luoyang, Nanjing, Beijing, and other historical capital cities.

After the Xinhai Revolution in 1911, the Kuomintang (Chinese nationalists) founded the Republic of China. In order to promote a sense of national unity and enhance the efficiency of communications within the nation, the government decided to designate a national language. The Beijing dialect of Mandarin and Guangzhou dialect of Cantonese were each proposed as the basis for a national language for China.[] In the beginning, there were attempts to introduce elements from other Chinese varieties into the national language in addition to those from the Beijing dialect; this was reflected in the first official dictionary of the national language, given the name (Pinyin: Guóy?, literally "national language"). But this artificial language had no native speakers and was difficult to learn, so it was abandoned in 1924. Ultimately, the Beijing dialect was chosen as the national language and it continued to be referred to as in Chinese in the Republic of China. Since then, the Beijing dialect has become the main standard for pronunciation, due to its prestigious status during the preceding Qing Dynasty.

Still, elements from other dialects do exist in the standard language, which is now defined as reflecting the pronunciation of Beijing, the grammatical patterns of Mandarin dialects spoken in the northern parts of China, and the vocabulary of modern vernacular Chinese literature. The People's Republic of China renamed the national language (Pinyin: P?t?nghuà, literally "common speech"), without otherwise changing the definition of the standard national language.[10]

Ethiopia

Ethiopia is a country where more than 80 nations, nationalities and peoples live together peacefully. Its people altogether speak over 80 different languages. Amharic is the official language of Ethiopia. Nevertheless, the working languages of regional states differ such as Afaan Oromoo and Tigrinya. English is the most widely spoken foreign language and is the medium of instruction in secondary schools and universities. The language of instruction in primary schools is the local languages of the regional states.

Finland

Finland has two national languages: namely the Finnish language and the Swedish language. The Constitution of Finland guarantees the right to use Finnish and Swedish in courts and other state institutions.[11][12] Despite the large difference in the numbers of users, Swedish is not officially classified as a minority language but equal to Finnish. Both national languages are compulsory subjects in school (except for children with a third language as mother tongue) and a language test is a prerequisite for governmental offices where a university degree is required. The constitution also grants the Sami and the Roma peoples the right to maintain and develop their languages: The Sami have partial right to use Sami languages in official situations according to other laws.[13]

France

French is the official language of France, according to Article 2 of the French Republic's constitution.[14]

Germany

Haiti

Haiti's official languages are Haitian Creole and French. While French is the language used in the media, government and education, 90-95% of the country speak Haitian Creole as the home language while French is learned in school.

India

There is no national language as declared by the Constitution of India.[16] Hindi or English is used for official purposes such as parliamentary proceedings, judiciary, communications between the Central Government and a State Government.[17]States of India are free to adopt one or more local languages for official purposes of that state. Additionally 22 official languages are accorded official status as mentioned in article 343/1 of the Indian Constitution. All of these languages carry equal official status and Government documents can be written in any one of these languages. Hence India has 22 major official languages and no National language.[18][19]

Indonesia

The official language of Indonesia is Indonesian. Indonesia has more than 700 living languages, making it the third most linguistically diverse country after Papua New Guinea and India. These 700+ languages, however, are without official status, and some are in danger of extinction. The largest local language is Javanese.

Iran

Persian (or Farsi) is recognised as the national language of Iran.[20]

Ireland

Irish is recognised by the Constitution of Ireland as the national language and first official language of Ireland, and the English language is recognised as a second official language.[21]

Israel

Hebrew became the national language of Israel with the adoption of the Nation-State Bill in 2018. Arabic, also an official language, became recognized as a language with "special status" used in state institutions.

Kenya

While English and Swahili are official languages, Swahili also has a special status as national language. None of the country's biggest languages (Gikuyu, Luo, Kamba, Kalenjin, etc.) have any explicit legal status on the national level, however the 2010 constitution enjoins the state to "promote and protect the diversity of language of the people of Kenya."[26]

Luxembourg

Luxembourg uses three official languages: Luxembourgish, French, and German. Previously Luxembourgish had no official status, but following a constitutional revision a law was passed on February 24, 1984 making Luxembourgish the national language. Furthermore, this law recognised the three languages of Luxembourg (Luxembourgish, French and German) as administrative languages.

Malta

The Maltese language is the national language of Malta. It is also the official language of the island, together with English. Maltese only is recognised as "national" in Chapter 1 of the Laws of Malta.

Namibia

Although English is the only nationwide official language in Namibia, there are also 20 National languages[], which are each spoken by more or less sizeable portions of the population and are considered Namibia's cultural heritage. All national languages have the rights of a minority language and may even serve as a lingua franca in certain regions. Among Namibia's national languages are German, Afrikaans, Oshiwambo, Otjiherero, Portuguese, as well as the languages of the Himba, Nama, San, Kavango and Damara.[]

Nigeria

Pakistan

Article 251(1) of the 1973 Constitution of Pakistan, titled National language, specifies: "The National language of Pakistan is Urdu, and arrangements shall be made for its being used for official and other purposes within fifteen years from the commencing day." Although Urdu has been declared an official language, so far all government documents, legislation, legal orders, and other official records are written in Pakistani English. Most higher education instruction is in English."[29] The National Language Authority is an organization established to make arrangements to promote Urdu since 1979.

Philippines

The 1973 Philippine constitution hegemonically imposed Tagalog national language at the expense of all other ethnic nationalities in the country and mandated development and formal adoption of a common national language to be known as Filipino. English (Philippine English) was also designated as an official language, "until otherwise provided by law".[30]

The 1987 constitution designated the Filipino language, which is based on Tagalog with the inclusion of terms from all recognized languages of the Philippines, as the national language. It also designated both Filipino and English as the official languages for purposes of communication and instruction, and designated the regional languages as auxiliary official languages in the regions to serve as auxiliary media of instruction therein.

More than 170 languages are spoken in the Philippines and almost all of them belong to the Borneo-Philippines languages group of the Austronesian language family. In 2007, a six-part series titled The Case of Ilokano as a National Language authored by Dr. Aurelio Solver Agcaoili of the University of Hawaii appeared in the Culture, Essays, Lifestyle of Tawid News Magazine.[31] In September 2012, La Union became the first province in Philippine history to pass an ordinance proclaiming a local language and a vernacular, Ilokano, as an official language. This move aims to protect and revitalize the use of Ilokano in various government and civil affairs within the province.[32]

The Filipino Sign Language is designated as the "national sign language of the Filipino deaf" as well as the official sign language for transactions of the Philippine government.

Poland

Article 27 of the Constitution states: "Polish shall be the official language in the Republic of Poland".[33]

Serbia

Singapore

Singapore has four official languages: English (Singapore English), Chinese, Malay and Tamil. Although English is the primary language of business, government, and education, Malay is designated as the national language. This is due to the geographical and historical ties to Malaysia as well as the recognition of ethnic Malays (about 14% of the population) as the indigenous people of Singapore.

Traditionally, the lingua franca among the different ethnic groups in Singapore was Bazaar Malay, a Malay-based creole. Since independence, the government has been promoting English as the main language of Singapore. The bilingual education policy requires students to study two languages: English and a "mother tongue" corresponding to the student's ethnicity. Malay is only offered to non-Malay students as an optional third language in secondary schools. As a result, English has displaced Bazaar Malay as the common language among Singaporeans. Therefore, despite the status of Malay as the national language, the majority doesn't speak it.

A majority (74%) of the population speaks German, while most of the remainder (21%) speak French, and minorities speak Italian (4%) and Romansh (1%, not monolingually). German speakers are predominant in most of the country, while French speakers occupy the western parts near the border with France, and the Italian speakers are situated to the south near the border with Italy, mostly within the Canton of Ticino. The Romansh speakers are concentrated in the Canton of Grisons in the south-east.[36]

Tunisia

The official language of the Tunisian state is Arabic.[39] However, that language is not the mother tongue of the population or used to communicate between Tunisian people, instead Tunisian Arabic plays these roles and is the national language of Tunisia.[40] Also, even without an official status, French is also used extensively in its written and spoken form in the administration, education and business environment and known by 63.6% of the population.[41] Also Berber minorities in the south-west and on Djerba Island use the Tunisian Chelha language to communicate between themselves.

Turkey

Turkish is the national language of Turkey per the Turkish constitution.

Wales

The Welsh language has official status within Wales, and as of the 2011 census, is spoken by 562,000 people, or 19% of the population.[44] The Welsh Language Board (Bwrdd yr Iaith Gymraeg) is legally tasked with ensuring that, "in the conduct of public business and the administration of justice, the English and Welsh languages should be treated on a basis of equality".[45]

Crown dependencies: Isle of Man

English is de facto the only official language. However a few words of Manx Gaelic (the historical national language) are sometimes encountered in Government institutions, largely for symbolic and ceremonial purposes, and it is the main medium of instruction in one primary school.

^"Tunisia Constitution, Article 1"(PDF). 2014-01-26. Archived from the original(PDF) on 9 February 2014. Retrieved 2014. Translation by the University of Bern: "Tunisia is a free State, independent and sovereign; its religion is the Islam, its language is Arabic, and its form is the Republic."